


Just Another Day

by silverfoxstole



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (1963), Doctor Who (Big Finish Audio)
Genre: And I love the banter between Lucie and Eight, Because there aren't enough Lucie fics, Gen, Humor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-15
Updated: 2017-04-15
Packaged: 2018-10-19 04:03:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,320
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10631811
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/silverfoxstole/pseuds/silverfoxstole
Summary: An ordinary morning in the TARDIS.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Takes place somewhere between Human Resources and Dead London. Partially inspired by a line from Orbis.

“Doctor? You in here?” Lucie called, poking her head around the door of the library.

Though the TARDIS was never usually what you’d call noisy (well, unless the cloister bell was heralding impending doom or the console started exploding), this morning it was unnervingly still; she’d wandered from bedroom to kitchen to console room and the place seemed strangely empty of Time Lords. He didn’t sleep much but could usually be relied upon to at least stick to a few habitual haunts, often either fossicking around in the ship’s innards or hunkered down in his armchair speed-reading some obscure book in a language that meant about as much to Lucie as computer code. Today, however, there was no sign of him. According to the scanner the ship was hovering in the vortex so he couldn’t have gone out without her, which was just as well as if he had he’d be in for a right earful when he got back.

Curious and, if she was forced to admit it, feeling lonely and up for a bit of a natter, she decided to try the one other place he was likely to go to ground; sure enough, his voice answered her from somewhere deep in the enormous room and if she squinted she could make him out, it becoming more obvious as she neared that he appeared to be balancing on a teetering pile of hardback books. Not that such a thing was particularly unusual; by Doctor standards it was pretty much par for the course.

Putting down her tea, Lucie raised her eyebrows and folded her arms, watching him for a few moments as he tried to reach something on the very top shelf of one of the extremely tall bookcases, before she enquired, “What the figgy pudding are you doing?”

“Ah, Lucie, there you are.” The Doctor glanced down at her with a quick smile. “Could you possibly give me a hand?”

“How, precisely? If you think I’m standing on your shoulders you’ve got another thing coming.”

“No, no, no, not that. Pass me that book over there, would you?” His hand waved vaguely to the left, the gesture managing to encompass half the library.

Lucie looked around. “Think you’re going to have to be a bit more specific than that.”

The Doctor sighed impatiently. “The blue one on the table just behind you. But be careful; it’s rather heavy.”

“This one? Doesn’t look that – oof!” She picked it up and almost staggered backwards under the weight. It was about the size of a large print dictionary, had gold-embossed lettering and looked in no way, shape or form as though it should weigh roughly the same as a small elephant. Struggling to lift it she peered at the title. “ʻTARDIS Manual’? There’s actually a book that tells you how to fly this crate?”

“For those that need it, yes. Pass it up here.” He held out a hand.

“Hang about: this is volume seventeen. Where are the rest?”

“I’m standing on them. And this is just the quick start guide.”

Lucie heaved the book above her head. “Like those sheets of paper you get with a new telly that tell you where to find the ‘on’ switch? Does that mean there’s a longer version?”

“If you have the patience and a spare couple of decades to read it.” The Doctor took it from her, holding onto a shelf with his free hand. The weight nearly tipped him over but he somehow remained upright, managing with quite impressive acrobatic skill to stand on one leg and slide the book on top of the pile. “You’ll find it down there; bays seventy seven to four hundred and twenty three.”

“You’re having a giraffe.”

“Am I?” he asked, distracted by the slightly alarming wobble his makeshift staircase gave just at that moment. “If you insist, but what am I supposed to do with it?”

Lucie shook her head. “What’re you looking for, anyway?”

“Some old magazines. I’m sure I put them away up here.”

“Seems like an awkward place to file ‘em.” She shot him a sly grin. “Mucky mags are they?”

He tutted. “Certainly not! Honestly, your mind... For your information I did some tidying up during my sixth life and they didn’t interest him any more. He was taller than me.”

“We do have something here for short-arses that makes climbing a doddle,” Lucie pointed out. “It’s called a ladder.”

“It’s also in pieces in the cookery section; one of the rungs was coming loose but I got a bit carried away and I’ve not had time to put it back together yet.”

She snorted. “You mean you don’t know how to.”

“Of course I do! I just... don’t have the correct screws at the moment, that’s all,” he said loftily, rummaging around on the shelf. There was a bang and a cloud of dust blew right into his face. Lucie tried not to laugh. He coughed, waving the dust away. “Aha! Here we are! Catch!”

She swore her reflexes were working on an instinctive level by now: she barely had time to stick out her hands before a bundle of old glossies descended from upon high. It was only by a miracle that she caught them, having to virtually throw herself to the right like a goalie after a penalty. “Your aim’s rubbish!” she shouted.

“Nonsense! Did you get them?”

“Yeah, no thanks to you; I’m going to need Savlon for me paper cuts. What _are_ these...?” Lucie picked one of the magazines up. “‘Railway Enthusiast’?! Mags about steam trains? _That’s_ what you’ve been making such a song and dance about?”

“They’re very useful. I was giving the Flying Scotsman a service and decided she could do with a coat of paint.” The Doctor was climbing down; he wasn’t wearing his coat and from this angle she was treated to a fantastic view of his rear. He was definitely not her type, oh no, but she did have to admit purely from a connoisseur’s perspective that he did have a rather nice bum. “I couldn’t remember the exact LNER livery.”

“Why am I not surprised? I bet you’re a closet train spotter, too, aren’t you?”

“You won’t spot many trains in a closet,” he told her lightly, jumping the last couple of feet and extracting the magazines from her grasp. Passing the table where she’d left her tea he picked it up and downed half of it on his way out of the library.

“Oi, you!” she yelled, chasing him. “Get yer own!”

“Oh, was that not for me?” the Doctor asked innocently. “I thought you’d had an uncharacteristic altruistic impulse and made me a cup.”

“That is not a cup, it’s a mug. _My_ mug, in fact. I know how you have your tea: like you’re going to share it with Queen Victoria. Bleedin’ thieving Time Lords,” Lucie muttered.

“She serves very good cucumber sandwiches, does Queen Victoria. Maybe I should take you to see her; she always did love a good curiosity.”

“Dropping names does not impress me. If you’d said she makes good chip butties I might have been interested.” Resigning herself to not getting her tea back she drifted over to the desk, which was usually covered with piles of half-read books, rolled up antique maps, old pens, bits of string and other odds and sods that the Doctor had left lying around. This morning that detritus had been joined by several bits of what appeared to be dismembered model steam engine; Lucie picked up a piece and regarded it at arm’s length. “I might have known you had a model railway. Does it have little houses and people waving as the trains go past?”

“Of course. There’s no point making a model if you don’t make it authentic.” The Doctor reached over and plucked the denuded Scotsman from her hand, putting it carefully back down next to his toolbox. There were several small screwdrivers laid out on the blotter, beneath a powerful magnifying glass on a stand.

Lucie perched on the edge of the desk. “Why’re you bothering to fix it? It’d be easier just to nip out and buy a new one instead of tinkering.”

“Because buying a new one when I can fix it is wasteful; besides, I happen to _like_ tinkering.” He gave the engine a pat. “And this one has realistic chuffing sound; you don’t get them like that any more.”

“Doctor, you have a time machine,” she pointed out.

“Well, yes, but that would be cheating. This is much more fun. Would you like to help?” There was a definite manic gleam in his eye and his tone was the slightly breathless enthusiastic one that always reminded her of a spaniel eager for its walk. If he had a tail it would be wagging. He was already rummaging around in one of the desk drawers, muttering to himself. “I’m sure I had... where are they... ah! Look: I’ve already got the paints, and there are some schematics in this issue which show the livery in detail. If you start on the carriages while I take a look at the engine - ”

“Irresistible as that offer is, I was rather thinking we could go out somewhere,” she said, the idea of sitting painting manky old toy trains while the Doctor rambled on and on about the age of steam filling her with private horror, “You know, the usual: land on a planet, annoy the locals, run away from a few monsters and back in time for tea, which, by the way, you will be making since you pinched mine.”

“I didn’t ‘pinch’ anything. You shouldn’t leave your things lying around.”

“A mug of tea is not a ‘thing’, and anyway - ” Lucie broke off when she realised he was grinning at her. “You are even more impossible than usual this morning, you know that?”

“Me?” The amusement segued smoothly into wounded innocence, eyebrows raised so far they almost met his fringe.

“Yeah, you,” she retorted, giving him a poke in the waistcoat and jumping off the desk, heading for the console.

“I have no idea what you mean,” the Doctor protested, but he followed her anyway and was soon immersed in checking readouts and bleeping buttons as sound of the TARDIS’s asthmatic engines rang through the room. Impatient, Lucie leaned across him and swiped the lever that activated the holographic ceiling; with an electronic hum the darkness overhead was replaced with the lowering clouds of an extremely grey sky.

“Well, that’s a disappointment,” she remarked. “Looks like Blackpool on a wet Wednesday. Boring as hell.”

“You shouldn’t be so dismissive. I’ve done some very interesting things on wet Wednesdays.”

“Oh, yeah? Do tell.”

His mouth twitched and he twiddled a couple of knobs on the console. “Another time, maybe. If you’re good.”

“You,” Lucie declared, “are no fun.”

“Ah, but you love me anyway.”

She couldn’t help laughing at that, as this time he fluttered his eyelashes at her. “And you’re completely full of it. So where are we, then?”

“According to the TARDIS: Brampton-on-Sea, the twenty-fourth of August 2014. Mid-morning,” the Doctor replied, turning his attention back to the readouts. “Sounds promising.”

Lucie pulled a face. “It does not. I’ve never even _heard_ of Brampton-on-Sea. It’s probably full of little old ladies on coach trips. And I bet it _is_ a Wednesday.”

“You know, I despair of humans sometimes, especially those from the early twenty-first century and beyond. You have no idea how to make your own entertainment.” Pulling the lever that opened the doors and whirling away from the console the Doctor grabbed his velvet coat from the hat stand, heading for the exit. He was halfway up the steps and almost into the coat by the time he realised Lucie wasn’t following. “What’s the matter? I thought you wanted to go out?”

“I did, yeah, but not to a manky old seaside town full of grannies. Seen enough of those in my time, and they’ll have pinched all the deckchairs by now.”

“Oh, well, in that case...” The Doctor did a one-eighty and was back across the floor almost before Lucie realised, making a beeline for his desk. “There’s always the Flying Scotsman! I’m sure you’re a dab hand with a paintbrush when you put your mind to it.”

“Oh, yes indeed. I’m so practised I can insert it up your - ” Lucie muttered under her breath, breaking off with a wide smile when he glanced at her, brows drawn together in a puzzled frown. “Actually, Doctor, maybe we should pop outside. For some fresh air, y’know?”

The frown cleared in a moment. “Excellent! I’m sure there’s a decent tea shop somewhere nearby; has to be, to cater for all those little old ladies.” Toy trains forgotten again he was off, this time snatching up Lucie’s jacket as he passed and throwing it to her. “Come on! You can buy me a cup.”

“What?!” Struggling into the denim Lucie gave chase, one sleeve flapping loose behind her. “ _You_ owe _me_ a cuppa, you thieving git! And biscuits, and a bloody great slice of cake!”

Through the doors she nearly cannoned into his back; he was standing stock still, staring at something in front of him. Lucie tried to peer round him, and her eyes widened to what felt like the size of saucers as she saw what was sitting on the seafront.

“Oh, my God,” she gasped. “Is that what I think it is?”

“It could be, if you’re thinking of an enormous alien octopus that seems to have wrapped itself round the pier,” the Doctor said quietly.

“Good. I was worried for a minute. So... no little old ladies and no deckchairs?”

“It would seem not.” He glanced upwards, squinting as a fat drip of water landed on his face. “You got one thing right, though: it _is_ raining.”

 


End file.
